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News site Semafor has launched an AI-powered editorial product called Signals, which uses AI-powered research from Microsoft's Bing search engine and OpenAI's ChatGPT to create a "global multi-source news feed," the media startup announced Monday.
Microsoft is sponsoring Signals and paying an undisclosed amount to fund the AI-powered offering, the Financial Times reported. Semafor created its own custom-built AI bot for journalists based on OpenAI's platform and Bing. Site editors check the bot's findings for accuracy, write synopses, and cite sources when necessary.
In a post on X, Semafor Founder and Editor-in-Chief Ben Smith called Signals an effort to improve the "broken" digital media landscape, emphasizing that AI tools will not be used to write articles. Instead, AI will assist in the research process on Signals-branded stories.
Semafor stated that AI is being deployed to help "combat bias, polarization and mistrust through real-time distillation of multiple global sources."
On the site, Signals stories produced with AI are clearly labeled as "Semafor Signals" and also as "supported by Microsoft." Beneath a "News" section on each Signals article is a "Signals" section, which aggregates context for the news story from a variety of different sources.
Signals stories currently appear on Semafor's homepage and will also be included in its main newsletter, according to the announcement.
Semafor's decision to embrace AI tools is a marked contrast to other outlets like The New York Times, which filed a lawsuit against Microsoft and OpenAI in December for alleged copyright infringement.
Semafor's use of AI isn't going as far as making AI write entire articles, according to the site. But other media companies like G/O Media, which owns sites like Gizmodo and Kotaku, have deployed AI-written content that was criticized by its staff last year.